Happy Earth DAy and here is Lucy !

We have been adopted by this kitty that we call among other thing, Lucy.  She started hanging about in the yard in January but would dash off if we got too close. Much to  Mz Ruby's chagrin,  she now thinks she owns the place. Ruby has to hiss or punch  or chase  her  if she gets too close or crossed the invisible area around Ruby known only to her having been the only cat for 5 years.

Lucy in the skies with blue eyes. See her right ear u cut out? i hope that means she was fixed. if you are a cat person that knows catch /fix /release, 

 perhaps you can tell me if that is a female her right ear clipping indicating  fixed.
.

I finally got a new camera a Nikon  coolpix. My older Canon Powershot 540, that worked great for 12 years no longer worked but  would only take dark photos or overexposed ones no matter how many times i studied the manual and attempted to change settings. It also ate up AA batteries like crazy. i would take them out in between shooting even. 

 I  have not been posting as would like  as photos are a good que for me to start a post.
Happy Earth Day

hibiscus blooming this morning

Tahitian gardenia,   a heavenly fragrance 

"everything here is mine "......Lucy

sunny saturday

I have been in studio preparing for the Haleiwa Art Festival that i do each July. I have juried into for the past 19  plus years so 2017 will be my 20 th show under those white billowing tents. As much as i love blogging, sometimes and for a period of time, i have no words to share,

 other than inner dialogue going on in my head, around and around. 

My hands are talking to my stuff and inner artyself, mostly. 

And just like any painting or quilt or story or piece of work, it simmers and changes and stops/starts and is resolved  in its' own time frame. It is in  this process where i am problem  creating and solving as it flows and if one stimmies me, i shift to another project because perhaps the next step has  just become clear to me by not thinking about it..but in the shift of thought/mind. Interesting. 

Anyone reading this that is a maker might recognize the joy/agony in the making process. Those who are curious about the finished work might gain a bit of  insight knowing that ideas do not come to most of us fully formed but rather in more fits and starts and parts and wrong turns ...
each one informing the next decision/s.

And so it goes; it is a journey for me and the piece is the log, the diary or proof of the documenting processes. It no longer is/it never never was   an idea.... 

the object is more of the sum of many ideas, it is itself, a quilt, a painting ,a story, a cake....a miracle perhaps and at least something that did not exist before.... 

OKAY, here are some of my favorite tools of the trade:

 cloth, paint, brushes, cutters, large work surface, water, small rocks. 

 This is how most of my work beings.

 And with that seed of a inkling of a possible idea kernal...it begins.

i must add each side track is fun like the

 3 brush containers in the front, 

under the wrapped fabric lurks an empty pint jar that once held my paints/inks.

 love quotes that say to me 

Yes! that is just what i was thinking and someone else has already located 

 and arranged those descriptive words, beautifully !!yea!!

If i am dreaming of creating a quilt using some of my fabric painted cotton 

in every color imaginable, 

i reach for scissors, pins, threads and one of two of my favorite sewing machines,

my Featherweight 221 singer

Noodles  the watch cat  

Noodles 

 or my Bernina 830 record, the old square one.

My current cat assistant and studio investigator, Ruby

I like joining  up fabrics on the FW and quilting free motion on Bernie 

 i have both of them set up in opposite ends in my studio so i can get up and move often.

Also, after machining there is always hand stitching involved and ....
i like to take that outside and sit under a shady tree.

So, do you have favorite tools or helpers in your make spot?

Be well, see well, Sonja

after the fair is over.......

Recovery from a weekend art show consists of some relaxing with feet elevated.
A rope hammock is best and the shade helps especially when breezes are blowing through.

This is important even if you have 4 feet, that your feet get some air time!!
 Then  to repack after unpacking  the bins and boxes of colorful fabric and hand made treasures, followed  closely by more feet's up and ice tea in hand. Then there is always stuff to catchup on like emails, laundry, and sleep, glorious sleep. so i do a little of this and some of that, retreating to a cool  spot with comfy chair now and then. This takes a few days, these days, to recover.

 I have consistently designed,  made, shown and sold my hearts' fabric gifts since my early twenties, in Hawaii since 1971 and show I  no sign whatsoever of stopping, only slowing down. I make slow art slowly. This last decade I have been very selective  to where and when (time to crank it down again!) to go out to respect the vintage child i find i have become.  She is wiser, funnier, kinder, greyer, shorter,..okay wider and  more easily fatigued and still at first, somewhat annoyed by  rude cluelessness of some people, then i find the humor in it all!

 Mostly, i am amazed and delighted with people that gravitate to my art in its color and style,

my style and that is what helps to feed my soul. i continue to practice my art of art.

 Kurt Vonnegut has a few sensible and quotable words on that.

(this is one of my postcards of fabric and paint and stitch, one of my favorite practices!)

SO,

A huge thank you all who walked through my tent last week end and had taken the time to notice, ask questions, and to purchase gifts for friends and yourself,
and  to express  your wonder and give comments of respect.

I am a gypsy on a life journey of color and fabric and am happy our trails crossed.
Aloha , Sonja

are you getting ready?

Christmas is coming
 and some of us are getting ready to gift by making things of wonder.

i wonder why i sometimes get ideas so late in the year. i still have some things i started in a Christmas past that i am putting on finishing touches,
 perhaps ideas that had not fully hatched until now.

 Each year for the past 16 years i have given/sent out invitations to my studio to those who have purchased my work along the way, at Haleiwa Arts Festival and other local venues. It goes out by snail mail. hand written hand made like the ornaments i fashion all year long.

i made a painted  fabric cat ornament for a friend's granddaughter.
She gets an ornament each year that mom or daughter or she  picks out. this is based on a black and white cat.. i hope i was able to channel what the cat looks like
all though i can't recall the name of this cat.
 ...we shall see!

Christmas Cactus is starting to bloom just in the nick of time!

 The angel  below

is a re purposed flag from a friend that keeps me in faded glory flags.

 i love this one as the stars are embroidered and old lace looks at home with the faded cotton. 

Mz Liberty has a flannel snowman ornie tucked  up under her arm.

Long may she wave!

the last willie melt snowman pin hand carved by DH is painted 

 wears the other end of the torn strip of RWB fabric.

it is the last one  until i can convince him to make another.  

excuse the blurry  "bullet"  Santas below

 that are standing in tennis shoes while they dry and then go on to the next step

 getting ballast in bottoms before  more paint and then gluing them on a slice of trees from past trees.

This sight  made me laugh as i found shoes a handy way to keep these dudes upright

 while i watched paint dry. 

the recent full moon set.time to get up and greet the day!

 
What are you finishing up beside that cold cup o coffee?
be well, see well,
 sonja

Ruby Ruby Ruby

Ruby the cat posing in the yard on chair arm with  black orchids.

she must investigate all that goes on in the yard when she is not snoozing somewhere.

These  orchids are in bloom July, August, and still in September and are a native of the Philippines. They smell like honey to me. 

 trichoglottis brachiata

they attach to the mock orange tree and put out roots that twine around the branches.

these  amazing orchids have been in bloom almost 3 months.

I inhale sweetness of nature daily and water them as well if there is not rain.

they really are more  ruby or Merlot in color to me.

Last week i had that hankering for sauerkraut.

But the can i had in pantry had to be returned to the market as it had started to leak,

the metal was somehow compromised so i was actually smelling it when i passed that cabinet.

While at Food Land

i spotted a colorful red cabbage which i brought home recalling that recently i had seen
 a lovely blog that had a recipe for it with beautiful photos as well.
link
  http://kitchenvignettes.blogspot.com/2012/09/ruby-sauerkraut.html
here is another link
http//www.gardenbetty.com/2013/06/ruby-kraut-and-why-its-so-good-for-you/

it is really so easy peasey because i waited about seven days, i opened my jewel of a jar and heard the fermentation sealed air pop. i took a forks worth and raised it to my mouth only to find that
 i had salted it way too much!

Washed, chopped, bruised, salted, sealed

 and wait.

and wait and wait    

i will be making Ruby kraut again very soon,

 this time paying attention to get the proportions of salt to amount of cabbage used balanced.
Perhaps add some other veggies to the mix.

i also need to get new rubber gaskets for the mason jars i have.
Not all was lost, 

 i managed to rinse out the brine and am almost empty of jar at this point.

i really enjoy the crunchiness of my first batch of  homemade Ruby Kraut!
 perhaps i will make
another batch today as i may be pleasantly hooked.
(and they look so lovely waiting on the window sill)

be well
 and may your food be  tasty and colorful.

sonja

Happy June 4 !

Here it is June already!

  I have not posted recently or arted  lately either
 because we were moving and all the stuff, stress and strength and stamina

that

      THAT TAKES WAS A  BIG huge DISTRACTION.

Not making something  artistic out of little tends to makes me a bit crabby as well. 

We have been moving /moved our selves  up the road, and stuff and lastly Ruby the cat, who's paws we buttered  first night so she would not dash back to the old house.
I feel a new leaf turning,
towards downsizing and determined to be less pack ratty from here on out!
 i have been not making art therefor feel more airhead than ever. Can't find things for all the boxes and DH decided to add a roof to insisting deck to rain shelter and shade,and to move fridge and shuffle cabs about  in the kitchen in the middle of move,
 (i wondered why he did not return one day for more boxes without topsis...).

so there are tools, and sharp things and extension cords, and sawdust, and  mucho confusion among boxes  about of kitchen and deck, as well the place in general.

 Good news is am exhausted enough not to comment or complain tho questions some times are read as complaints.Oh well

                                      

Now Today  is DH b day, again
so i might like to bake some overly sweet cupcakes or make a card or something,
i collected  flowers yesterday from plumeria trees so i can string them up perhaps,

providing i can locate any of those creative supplies to do so.

be well,

 and stay put! Sonja

Quote collector that i am and post #100

Oscar Wilde often said words i can't forget.

 Words that rang a bell that still can ring. i ran across a new one today 

to add to my growing collection.

if you read my blog you will find some favorite quotes peppered down the right margin. new ones appear, some disappear or are rearranged as a pattern appears. 
Perhaps soon they will need their own blog!

"Mere color, unspoiled by meaning, and unallied with definite form, can speak to the soul in a thousand different ways."

Oscar Wilde
I came across this quote above on a blog i read recently, lo i can't recall which..
there are so many talented and artistic blogs out there just in the fabric
category!

Back in 2007 I made the post card below for an exchange with theme of quotes!

Boy Howdy, I'm in I said !!

with a childhood photo, 
fabrics, paints, button, machine free motion,threads and lace,
i brought into being this 4"x 6" postcard 

of what that quote meant to me at that moment and looked like.

  "Be yourself. everyone else is already taken "  O.W. again! WOW!!

I think i respond to certain quotes because of the kernel of truth and often  humor embedded in those few words that i hear.  I often find them to be a jumping off point for my imagination to leap into a project.  or a smile.

do you respond to quotes?

what are your favorites ? 

And as this is post number 100 

 and 

if you are a reader that might like a piece of my hand painted fabric, 

leave a comment  by Feb 28 and

 if Ruby the studio cat helper pulls your name from the basket,

i'll send out a  painted fat quarter of my choice 
or Ruby's as you can see above she is very interested in investigating fabric!. 
How's that for a helper !

have a great weekend !

Sonja 

Ruby's first Christmas, some flat angels and a winter sunset

 

 

What can  I do with strips of painted fabric and just a winkling  of AN IDEA

and A CHALLENGE?

why I can sew them together with joy! 

and cut out wedges

 

and make heads and wings and hair and

 call them flat angels and send them away to some of my art making pals

 

"Look, I found more fabric for you to paint upon!"

this is Ruby's first Christmas and it turns out she is very helpful in the studio!  

"later I can press it for you, while I sleep!"

said the kitty that snores.

peaceful dreams

 

Happy holidays to you and to all a good night!

circle revisited

"Circle Heat"  33''x 33'' 

by Sonja Hagemann  2013

 

I started this quilt with circles of color in mind.

 a shape that I return to time and time again, especially as  just finished one

 that was composed of many many squares. 

 I painted up a batch, perhaps a dozen circles, from center outwards on pieces of

fabric about 10 inches square.

 

 

 then I  sliced the  circles in half and rearranged them

 in a manner that pleased me

 

 

I played around with placement until I got a harmonious combo before joining blocks together.  this above photo also shows possible boarders and binding  materials.

 I have a flannel covered stretch canvas so I can place quilt parts on it  

and step away to see if  I like arrangement.

sometimes walking back into a room,  at glance I can tell  that I need to

 move things about or away.

 

 

I painted circles on the fabric that was to become the back of this quilt.
(more circles !)
this shows the free motion quilting  done on my Bernina 830 Record.

 

(Ruby is inspecting the Bernina and a painted fabric .)

 

this

shows both sides now with back flipped over onto front.

 I have  often thought of my quilts as two sided and for decades have painted or joined up orphaned blocks or a combination of  to create a backing.

Why not have the fun of  surprise and choice!

 

 

  the completed "Circle Heat" quilt.

It has been hot this summer/fall and my colors and quilting repeat those

waves of warmth.

 I hope you enjoyed my short version of my journey of composing a circle quilt,

surely it is not the last.
 

be well, Sonja

I am linking  this post up to ninamarie's off the wall Friday
gathering of art bloggers .
 

 http://ninamariesayre.blogspot.com/